Mom invents app to stop teens from ignoring parent phone calls

A new app shuts down a teen’s phone if he doesn’t answer a call from mom or dad.

A Houston mom was fed up with her teenage son ignoring her calls and texts to his mobile phone. She’d call and call and he’d never pick up. Her texts seemed to be sent into a black hole.

Sharon Standifird decided something needed to be done and figured she could use modern technology to get Bradley to pick up the phone.

“We need to develop an app that just shuts their phone completely down and they can’t even use it,” Standifird told CBS News. “And I started — literally just started researching how to develop an app.”

After months of research and working with developers, Standifird introduced “Ignore No More” last week. The app takes control of a teen’s smartphone and shuts it down if he doesn’t answer a call from a parent. Bradley can still call 911 or his mom — but he can’t access any of his other contacts, games, videos or apps or browse the Internet. Once he calls his mom, she can reactivate Bradley’s phone by entering a special password on her phone.

Standifird installed the app on her son’s phone and she said it’s working.

“Bradley needs to call me because I’m the person that has the unlock password,” she told CBS.

“I thought it was a good idea, but for other people, not me,’ Bradley jokingly chimed in.

Ignore No More is available for Android phones via Google Play; it costs $1.99.